Bethesda Announces Battlecry

Bethesda today announced it's new free to play action game named Battlecry that's oddly enough being developed by Battlecry Studios. The game's site can be found here, based on the games reveal trailer it looks to be a game that's similar to the oh so popular shooter Team Fortress 2 and the recently popular melee focused game Chivalry Medieval Warfare, with the levels being designed by someone that worked closely on Half Life 2, Viktor Antonov. The gist of it is that you're set in world in which gunpowder has been banned and the two sides (Cossacks and Royal Marines) are at war. The game is set to have a beta in 2015 so do not expect a release anytime soon and so far is only slightly confirmed for PC.

This quote is taken directly from the Battlecry site and explains a bit more about what is going on:

Take on the role of an elite warrior and engage in brutal, high-action, 32-player battles in a variety of gameplay modes. Responsive, smooth controls unleash violent, high-impact, and stunning combo attacks previously reserved for modern brawlers. Dynamic movement allows you to seamlessly grapple, evade and mantle to quickly cover distances and evade the other team. Engage in combat and use the game’s Adrenaline system to unlock special powers for a short time or conserve Adrenaline to unleash your lethal Ultimate ability when the time is right.

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With that being said the game will be melee focused combat with a slight bit of non-gun ranged attacks based on the reveal trailer. As with all free to play games there is always the communities concern on whether or not the game will be 'pay to win' and thankfully Executive Producer Rich Vogel commented on that in his announcement post, you can see his quote below:

Our commitment to community and players also means ensuring that BATTLECRY's core gameplay experience will always be free. You only purchase the items you want - things to change your appearance or to add something special. In our games, it’s skill and time spent in the game that determines success; there are no purchases you must make simply to remain competitive.

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Personally I feel that with him saying that it adds a lot of hope to the game for players that do not want to spend any money on it and actually just play for free, without having to worry about someone else having a crazy advantage because they spent X amount of money in-game.

The reveal trailer can be seen below:

My opinions on this game is that it being melee focused it will add something different to the game instead of your usual run and game shooter that we see all the time now. I have high hopes that Bethesda will put out a quality game that can actually have a long lasting appeal instead of releasing big and then dying off quickly. With the beta being in 2015 I can expect a Q4 official release for the game coming out onto at least PC and possibly next-gen consoles but that remains to be seen as most F2P games come out onto PC and rarely onto consoles.